The security of information resources, such as, data, networks, systems, information, business intelligence, hardware, software, and other resources, is an increasingly important issue, particularly given their growth over the last decade and people's reliance on them. For example, networks are used by institutions, schools, organizations and other entities to communicate and store electronic documents and information, among other things. These networks may include networks coupled to or providing access to other computer networks. Greater utilization of networks for storing and communicating information resources has produced a corresponding increase in the size and complexity of networks in general.
With the growth of networks, and the amount and importance of information resources available on the networks, there is also a need for better and more intelligent security. One approach to securing larger and more complex networks is to use a greater number and variety of security assessment tools. Security assessment tools are used to evaluate the security of information resources by determining susceptibility to security events that threaten the security of the information resources, such as an attack from hackers, or other event. Security assessment tools are also used more and more frequently to closely monitor a network that has access to information resources.
However, conventional security assessment tools are not able to provide a standard index or other metric that may be updated at periodic intervals, and that may represent the security of a set, subset, or other collection of information resources. Consequently, the relative security of a specific subset of information resources may not be compared to the general security of information resources, or to the relative security of another specific subset of information resources. Further, trends in the security of information resources generally, or of a specific set of information resources may not be viewed or compared over a period of time.
In light of these and other problems, there is a need for an improved system and method of security assessment that provides a metric that represents the security of (or risk to) information resources or sets, subsets, or other collections thereof.